Abdication!

The fictional story collection Mumm’s Tales of Abdication serves as the source for three “episodes” tied together by a singing, dancing Narrator (Trenton Clark) in the style of a 60’s or 70’s TV variety show. In the first piece, a loser from Staten Island horrifies his family by announcing his plans to sign up for a full-time, 33-month virtual reality experiment compared to The Matrix. Next up, two patients at the Northwest Psychosurgical Institute decide to give romance one last try before submitting to an “amygdala-resurfacing” procedure known colloquially as a “love lobotomy.” And in the final episode, set in a near alternative future, a woman takes a five hour bus ride to her nearest Spectrum Bureau to petition to have her color changed—from purple to orange.